Redemption
by deceptivelycomplex3925
Summary: Emma is inexplicably enthralled with the queen she's never met; of whom she knows nothing about. But when her eyes fall upon the queen for the first time, Emma's certain that she will be her absolute undoing.


**Okay, so I know every time I try to write a multi-chapter I totally leave it unfinished and I am really, terribly sorry for that! But, I have so many ideas that flow in and out of my mind and this was one of them. I got it from the SwanQueen Strange Birds AU video on YouTube and I just had to write this. It's my own take on the video and my own brain forming and changing ideas and scenes and I thoroughly enjoyed writing this first chapter. I'm currently working on the second one and though I can't promise it'll be up within the week I can promise there ****_is_**** going to be a second chapter. I'm not really well-versed on the vernacular in the Enchanted Forest and this is for my own personal enjoyment so the way they speak is how I conjured it up in my mind that they speak so bear with me on that. Also, Emma has magic in this. As does Regina (obvs). Anyway, I'm done rambling…for this chapter at least…so, enjoy!**

**Oh, and if you haven't seen the video I mentioned above, I highly suggest doing so before reading this. If only to better picture the direction and feel of my story. (also, in the video it shows their first encounter was at a ball; I changed that)**

It was the look in her eyes. The almost palpable sadness there; the complete and utter emptiness. As if she had lived through so many horrors, had lived through _too many_ horrors and was completely void of any and all other emotions – save for maybe sadness and pain – which were both very much present in her eyes now.

The look in her eyes was haunted and it demanded Emma Swan's attention. It was haunted, it was empty and it was familiar. It was a look she saw every time she was in front of a mirror.

She tried to avoid them now.

But she couldn't ignore such a look on such an almost unfairly beautiful face.

She reached up to remove the cloak – which she always tried to keep over her head any time she left her cottage – to get a better look at this woman who seemed to have rendered her feet motionless in the middle of the slowly growing crowd.

She was in the market; sorely in need of more food and apparently she had come on a day where a gathering was to happen.

Her eyes flickered to an incredibly well-dressed older gentleman wearing a crown.

Emma's eyebrow quirked upwards. Ah, so this was the king then.

_How very fitting._

She smirked to herself; this was exactly how she had always pictured a king to look.

Her eyebrows furrowed when the king walked up to the woman, _her _woman and laid a hand at the small of her back.

She briefly startled at herself for using the possessive but the thought was wiped away entirely when she saw how his touch made the woman flinch. It was very brief and it seemed as if she tried to keep it unnoticeable to the man who had elicited it.

But Emma was watching and she did notice.

An inexplicable surge of rage shot through her body in an instant. He didn't have the right to touch this woman. This woman who seemed so incredibly broken, not fragile – _no, definitely not fragile_ Emma surmised as she saw the woman lift her head high and clench her jaw at something the king had just whispered to her – never fragile. This woman was to be cherished, _worshipped_ and he did _not_ have the right to touch her.

Emma clenched her own jaw, taking a step forward to – what? What was she even going to do? Grab _the king _by his forearm and tell him to never put his hands on this woman whom she had never even seen before today all because she didn't like the way it made her cringe when he did so?

A large part of Emma's brain nodded in the affirmative and she took another step forward before her eyes fell on the woman's clothing.

She had been so ensconced in the woman's dark eyes – she couldn't ascertain which color from so far away – that she hadn't even made it past the woman's face.

She was dressed just as regally as the king. His hand was at her back. Emma squinted. He was wearing a ring. The woman was wearing one as well.

And instantly Emma felt incredibly guilty. And also a bit foolish.

This was the king's wife. The queen. Of course he had a right to touch her – even if it seemed as though she didn't want his touch just as much as Emma didn't enjoy seeing him touch her.

That thought assuaged her guilt.

This woman – the queen, she corrected in her mind – didn't want her husband's touch. That much was obvious. Was he the reason she was so sad? So empty?

Another flare of unmitigated anger had Emma inhaling deeply to try to tamp it down. She felt a completely unbidden spark of magic, hot and sharp, shoot through her veins and she exhaled slowly, willing it away. It headed her wish and ebbed away, her shoulders sagging in relief when it was completely gone.

Emma turned her lip up in disgust.

She had been mere seconds away from exposing herself to this large crowd of townsfolk over a _woman._

Whom she didn't even know.

She shook her head once more, inhaling deeply again before her eyes narrowed at the king, his hand still at the small of the queen's back.

How in the hell could the king of all people have someone like _her_ and has already screwed up so royally that even his hand on her back makes her wince?

Emma clenched her jaw harder this time.

Unintentionally, she took another step forward and not having taken her eyes away from the queen, stepped right on the back of the person's shoe whom had apparently been standing right in front of her the whole time.

The person whipped around – an older gentleman with awfully crooked teeth – and scowled at her.

"Watch where you're steppin' young lady." His voice was a gurgling kind of raspy.

Emma's eyebrows shot up and she chuckled, amused at the moniker.

"Very sorry, sir. It was an accident." She held her hands up in mock defense and then chuckled again when he narrowed his eyes at her, giving her a hard once-over before turning back to face where the king and queen were now seated at the top of a small, wooden, make-shift platform.

Emma blinked.

When the hell had that been there?

She shook her head at herself. And she called herself a thief.

She didn't even see a damn - really quite big - platform not ten feet away from her.

She had yet to even meet this woman – _damn it, the queen_ – and she was already a potent distraction.

The queen – she really needed to figure out her name so she didn't have to keep badgering her brain for repeatedly messing up her title – was seated in what seemed like a matching make-shift, wooden chair and she pursed her lips at how utterly small and uncomfortable-looking it was.

She was the damn queen for god's sake. Couldn't this town at least make her a better chair?

She furrowed her eyebrows at herself. Why was she being so incredibly hostile toward a town that she frequently got her supplies from? That she actually liked?

The queen herself looked just as displeased, if not more so than Emma was, and by the curl of her lip, Emma guessed it was only a matter of seconds before she turned to lament her disapproval to the almost laughably scrawny guard standing just to her left.

Emma chuckled softly before her eyes moved back to the king who was now standing in the middle of the platform, smiling and gesturing to the crowd as he bellowed words Emma hadn't even realized he was speaking until now.

She focused on what he was saying for a few minutes and then rolled her eyes.

The king was just 'taking a stroll through this _lovely _little town' to make sure they knew he cared about each and every one of his citizens.

Emma snorted and did it once more when it elicited the turning heads of a few irritated townspeople.

She moved to put her cloak back on and with one last parting glance to the queen, weaved her way through the disgustingly enraptured crowd and made her way back to the thick layer of woods.

She could come back tomorrow when the king's annoying touches and superficial words weren't anywhere near the market.

She was just lifting her foot over a fallen tree trunk, wondering if her dislike of the king was because he seemed so incredibly bogus or because he was so blatantly oblivious to his wife's discontent – Emma _really _didn't like seeing him touch her – when she heard a voice behind her.

"Stop!"

That's all that was said. It wasn't yelled and she turned around, hand flying to the knife in her cloak before it froze around the handle.

It was the queen. The woman. _Her _woman.

She was now only a few feet away, the large trunk the only thing between them and the queen was looking at her as if she was an anomaly. Her long, ebony pony tail fell over her shoulder in waves and Emma's hand not currently wrapped around her knife twitched to run through those silky locks.

The queen quirked her head to the side.

"Who are you?"

Her voice was raspy, deep and incredibly dulcet. If silk could magically turn into a voice, Emma was sure it would certainly sound like this woman's.

Emma found her mouth opening without her permission.

"I'm Emma."

_What? _

Emma scowled at herself. God damn it, this woman.

The queen quirked a perfectly shaped eyebrow and tilted her head in amusement at the swiftness of the answer.

"And has the king done something to offend you, Emma?"

Emma blanched at that.

"What – um, no?"

The queen hummed and nodded her head, a smirk forming on her lips.

"Are you quite sure? You were looking at him as if you wanted to take that knife you're gripping so tightly and use it to cut off a very vital part of his anatomy."

Her head snapped down to look at her hand, removing it from her knife as if burned – she hadn't realized she was holding onto it – and let it fall to her side. The queen was poorly hiding a chuckle and Emma scrunched her face up, disgusted, as the image of the king's _anatomy _flashed unbidden through her mind.

_Ew_. But by the glint in the queen's eyes she couldn't tell if that innuendo was intentional or not.

The queen's smirk hinted that it more than likely was.

Emma moved to take off the hood of her cloak and watched as the queen's dark – they were a chocolate brown – eyes followed the movement.

"Um, well, I just – uh," She tucked a strand of her loosely curled hair behind her ear, down-casting her eyes, mumbling.

"I didn't like the way he was touching you."

She bit her lip and looked up nervously. The queen was still looking at her amused – as if she hadn't heard that last part.

Emma realized she really hadn't and was only given more proof when another arch of an eyebrow followed the queen's next words.

"What was that, dear?"

Emma nibbled on her lip again and decided then and there that she would never ever lie to this woman. She didn't even know if she would ever see her again – which she probably never would unless it was a chance meeting like today at the market – but she felt connected to her; even if it was only one-sided.

And so she made a silent vow to herself to never ever lie to the woman standing before her like she has done to every single person in her life so far.

Her voice was unwavering when she spoke, her eyes held firmly in place with the queen's.

"I didn't like the way he was touching you."

Emma watched, silently entranced as emotion after emotion flittered across the face of this woman who was supposedly devoid of them.

First was widened eyes, and eyebrows shooting up; shock. Then there was intrigue, amusement. Then there was shock again before it all fell and was replaced with resounding anger.

Emma had forgotten about anger. Anger was an emotion.

And the queen was very, very angry right now. She was almost glowing with it.

She took a small but thunderous step forward, her leather pants – why had Emma not noticed she was wearing those before? – coming to brush up against the bark of the fallen tree, her lip curling upwards as she pointed a gloved finger at Emma.

"How the king touches me is none of your concern, and if you wish to keep ogling me as you were doing so fervently before, you'd do well to remember that, _Emma._"

The queen spat the name as if it was disgusting, as if it tasted that way on her own tongue.

Emma's mouth fell open and she ducked her head in embarrassment, feeling her face heat up at the queen's words.

God damn it, she had been really obvious about that hadn't she?

Emerald eyes snapped up when the queen addressed her again.

"Am I understood?"

Her words were low, dangerous, and Emma conceded again.

_Definitely not fragile. _

Her words were a bit shaky, from lingering embarrassment and also a bit of fear of this new side of the queen.

She was downright scary in this moment.

And yet, Emma thought, she wasn't really worried for her safety. The queen was looking at her with such venom, such fire, and Emma probably should have been scared for her life – and admittedly, she was, but honestly not as much as she _should_ have been – she _should_ be cowering in her shoes, _should_ have felt a spark of her magic, white and jagged, in her fingertips – an almost inherent reaction to imminent danger – which she most likely was in – but for the life of her, Emma could only internally berate herself for not asking this woman's name when she had the chance.

"Yes, Your Majesty."

She bowed her head for added effect.

She may have been the object of the queen's amusement only moments before but she wasn't deluded. This _was the queen_. And for all her knowledge on how to address a queen – which definitely was more than a little miniscule – she did know this much.

The queen's lips pursed briefly before she gave Emma a hard once-over – honestly, what was with people and giving her once-overs? – this one eliciting an altogether different reaction from Emma, and turned to stalk away, her long, black cape whipping behind her as she did so.

And of all the things Emma could have been thinking – why had she not noticed her cape? Her leather pants? Her more than generous cleavage barely being contained in what had to be a tightly bound corset. Why was she aroused right now? Did the fact that the queen - intentionally or unintentionally – had inferred that she might get to ogle her again mean that actually _would_ see her again? Why the _hell_ had she not gotten her name? – the only thing that came to mind was:

"Holy shit."


End file.
